Microsoft still beats Apple in cash and investments, for now
Back during the earnings call a few weeks ago, it was mentioned that Apple has a jaw-dropping almost $40 billion just sitting around in cash. In the chat, we started talking about other companies that might have that much money in the hopper -- Google came up, but I don't think we were able to guess another one. But it turns out Apple isn't even the most flush company out there, and the name of the first might surprise you: According to this chart on Silicon Alley Insider, Microsoft is currently sitting on just slightly more money than even Apple, with Google and Intel coming close behind; although Apple briefly pulled ahead of MS at the end of 2008, the Redmond Revenue Racers had more cash through most of '09 than Apple did.
Well how 'bout that. Of course, the current curves are not so favorable to Microsoft (after the Win7 update push slows down a bit) so it may not be long before Apple's pile grows even bigger. We can probably look for some significant acquisitions from all of these companies very soon -- with the rest of the economy down and lots of interesting ideas looking to sell, odds are we'll see some of this money spent on worthy purchases.
[via Cult of Mac]
